Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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39 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Barely beyond useless, and often wrong, January 11, 2006
I bought the Rosetta Stone program before I went to Thailand, and I guess I picked up a few basic words. I was, for example, pretty proficient at saying "the boy is under the airplane" (a phrase with which the course designers evidently had a troubling obsession as they tested me on it approximately 10 times per lesson).
Even the basic words, though, are in fact almost never used by Thai people, or at least that's what my native Thai girlfriend tells me. For example, RS teaches you "suneck" for dog but the Thai always say "maa,"; RS teaches "chay chera" for old man, but the Thai always say "chay gaeao."
And the grammar lessons are simply ridiculous -- there is no way to extract any real meaning from them because the verb phrases are not broken down into individual components. For example, they show a picture of two girls jumping and then a voice intones "dekdekpooying gamlangcrohdhotganyu." So I think "jumping" is "gamlangcrodhotganyu," which seems like a very long and very unmanageable verb, and I despair; only later do I learn that "crodhot" is "to jump" and "gamlang [verb] yu" means to be doing it right now, and that "gan" is something you stick on a verb when more than one person are doing the action together. Oh! Ok! NOW I get it. But this was NEVER made clear in the program.
One last comlpaint: It's use of pictures is problematic. For example, it uses a picture of a kid skateboarding to teach "hok loam," which means to fall down. But it doesn't look like he's falling, it looks like he's just, well, riding a skateboard. I only learned the real meaning of hok loam after I moved here.
My advice: Save the money unless you want to have some laughs with a Thai friend. To learn the language, the best thing I bought was a pocket book call "Thai Without Tears" by Dennis Sigaller, which gives really useful grammar and has the easiest tone signs of any of the books I've used.
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45 of 52 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Anyone for guessing games?, March 7, 2006
Boy was my tail waging when I received the bright yellow box containing my 92 lessons of Rosetta Stone Thai Level 1. Wow...92 lessons! I'll be fluent at last! Every advertisement I recall for this product indicated an "entry level" Thai teaching tool, and since I had visited Thailand twice before -- and already had a few key words and phrases in my pocket - and, even studied spoken Thai in Bangkok for a few weeks -- I installed the software the first day and, excitingly, got started on lesson 1.
What, no English??
That's right: 92 lessons of Thai, with Thai speakers blazing through their native language at record speed - describing little pictures -- without offering even a single breath of spoken or written English anywhere.
After 5 or 6 lessons of these picture-type guessing games, I started to get good at picking the right answer, but realized that learning the actual language ran along the same lines as hitting the lottery. I finally put the bright yellow box -- and all it's very expensive contains - up on the self for a while.
Total immersion (yea right),
Rosetta Stone claims, "We all learn our childhood language by associating new words and phrases with the world around us."
True. But this product communicates through vague-little pictures on a screen - not "the world around us."
"The Rosetta Stone method replicates this process by presenting vivid, real-life images to convey the meaning of each new phrase."
No it doesn't.
The fact is, a child will sit and listen to a language for 2 years without saying a bloody word [slang]. And when he finally gets the nerve up to say something it's something primitive like, "ma ma...da da." Then, over time, and with constant parental encouragement (every waking moment of a child's life) and with all the people around the child playing funny little word association games, a child begins to make sense of the language, and begins to use the language to get what it wants.
On the other hand, I'm 42 years old. And I speak and write in my native language perfectly already. I therefore have a unique advantage over a child at learning a language because I have my native language to compare the new one to. I can also focus my attention, use a computer, repeat something a few times till I get it right, take suggestions, and wake up the next day and do it all again.
What I don't have, and what this software blatantly doesn't offer at all is something along the lines of a simple English explanation.
I don't read Thai script either, but I would love to. Guess what? Everything in the software is written in Thai script without a single English translation.
Let me ask you a question; does a child just start reading English? Or, does a teacher introduce the child to each letter, one by one, and then explain to the child what each letter is called, and what sounds each letter makes?
Of course the latter is true, but the good folks at Rosetta Stone seemed to have missed it.
Rosetta Stone needs top get off the high horse and listen to its learning public. Everyone whom buy this software says the same thing, "it's not for beginners."
Make a software that has a built-in tutor; one that you can refer to in English, one that explains grammar and proper word order, and you got a winner. Then, and only then, would this software be amazing for any level student.
Someday I'm going to dust off that bright yellow box and figure out what the hell they're saying. But for now, and without making this sound like a competitor trying to pitch a different product, I'll just say that I'll be sticking with a course that offers a proper English translation.
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not for beginners, December 16, 2006
When I first used "Rosetta Stone Thai," I was very disappointed. To quote another reviewer, "$180.00 guessing game." But I gave it a chance on account of how expensive it is. I used it everyday for a week. That was enough for me. I put it away and didn't touch it again for another year and a half.
The software basically tells you a phrase in Thai. It shows a selection of 4 pictures. One of which, the phrase is describing. You have to pick the right picture. There are several variations of this game on the software-- plus it has writing exercises and a voice recognition application. If this does not sound fun or (more importantly) if you think this is not a way for you to learn Thai effectively, don't throw your money away on this software.
I give "Rosetta Stone Thai Level 1" two stars because after I had learned some Thai (by using another method), I could use this software to quiz myself on uncommon phrases... such as, "The boy is under the plane."
I have said some foul things about this software. BUT! This program is fairly effective for intermediate learners. This is decent supplementary program especially for reading Thai. Learners can read a phrase then hear the phrase spoken by a native Thai speaker to see if they read it correctly. For the most part, the phrases used in this software are not useful in everyday conversation. Yet, the phrases are uncommon enough that it may help a learner comprehend Thai better. Even when the phrase uses familiar vocabulary, it could help with listening comprehension because the words combinations may be different from what the student is accustom to.
If "Rosetta Stone Thai" cost $20 or less, this would not be a bad program.
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